Barbara

Nothing says Valentine's Day quite like an enormous flower show, and the 65th Annual Santa Barbara Orchid Show measures up nicely. Browse displays of hundreds of orchid species from North and South America, the South Pacific and Asia. A vast selection of blooming orchid plants, corsages, artworks and orchid supplies will be for sale. Complete lists of other romantic Valentine's happenings, including dining, night life and music, are available at findlocal.latimes.com. Earl Warren Fairgrounds, 3400 Calle Real.

New York Mayor Bill de Blasio stopped by "The View" on Monday and told departing host Barbara Walters that he was declaring May 16 "Barbara Walters Day. " May 16 is Walters' final day on "The View" and her last day as TV personality. The 84-year-old broadcaster is planning to retire when her time on the show she co-created ends. The mayor called Walters a "living legend" for over 50 years. Walters, ever the master of the subtle dig, told De Blasio, "It's very kind. Mayor Bloomberg never did this for me. " PHOTOS: Talk show hosts who didn't make the cut De Blasio replied, "Times are changing.

A totalitarian state with a Kafkaesque bureaucracy, East Germany was a nation suffused with fear and suspicion. Yet it was also a society in which utopian ideals motivated individual sacrifices in the name of building a better way of life. The new film "Barbara" examines the contradictions of the former German Democratic Republic, transforming the everyday paranoia under the socialist regime into a quietly gripping thriller. "Barbara" won the Silver Bear prize for director and co-writer Christian Petzold at the Berlin International Film Festival and is Germany's submission for the foreign-language Academy Award.

Junior point guard Max Hazzard of Los Angeles Loyola has picked up a scholarship offer from UC Santa Barbara. He is playing this spring and summer with the Oakland Soldiers, which is loaded with top players. Eric.sondheimer@latimes.com

Not long ago, Barbara and Ethan Gruska - the fresh-faced siblings at the core of L.A.'s Belle Brigade - were deep in a rehearsal with their two bandmates. The goal that afternoon was reworking the songs on the Belle Brigade's self-titled 2011 debut so that they fit alongside tunes from the group's just-finished follow-up. It took some doing. A sunny blast of retro West Coast folk-pop, "The Belle Brigade" pulled deeply (and openly) from crowd-pleasing forebears such as the Beach Boys and Fleetwood Mac. The new album, by contrast, begins with a digitally processed train whistle laid atop a booming drumbeat.

Some people take care of orchids. Others take care of guinea pigs. Barbara takes care of tropes. Most of the day she's a 51-year-old seamstress in Illinois and a caregiver for her husband. But in her spare time, Barbara tends to four tropes: "Cool Bike," "Badass Longcoat," "You Fail Logic Forever" and "Silly Reason for War." "They were a mess, they needed to be cleaned up, and nobody else was doing it, so I adopted them," she says. "It's equivalent of wiping down the sink every morning after I brush my teeth."

March 30, 2013 | Hilary MacGregor, MacGregor is a writer in Los Angeles

I have been married to my husband for 10 years. He is still my favorite person in the world. But sometimes I look at what time has done: I feel like he takes me for granted, and the qualities that once delighted him and made me irresistibly lovable increasingly drive him insane. I believe the people you love the most should get the best treatment in the world. Sometimes I feel like he thinks you get to treat them the worst. I told him that. "That's horrible," he said, barely paying attention, as he fiddled with my iPhone trying to get Spotify to work.

[Warning: This post contains plot spoilers about the upcoming movie “August: Osage County.” While we don't think they'll ruin the experience, you might be mad anyway. Please read at your own risk.] TORONTO -- If you saw Tracy Letts' Pulitzer Prize-winning black comedy "August: Osage County" on the stage in any of the numerous cities it played a few years back, chances are you were struck by one scene above all else. The final one, that is, in which matriarch Violet Weston is seen sitting on the stairs of the house she once ruled, abandoned by her adult daughters, especially eldest daughter Barbara, who don't/can't/won't stay and take care of a woman who, let's face it, has made her and her sisters' lives pretty miserable.

And the Oscar for humility goes to: Gregory Walcott. The 82-year-old retired actor will attend the Academy Awards on Sunday night, with roughly 300 film and TV credits to his name. He's one of those journeymen whose face you recognize and whose name you don't. Walcott's date will be 14-year-old Isabel, his granddaughter, who will help her grandfather complete a goal he set for himself many years ago. That goal had nothing to do with fame or fortune or an Oscar nomination.

Comedy can intoxicate you, put you in a soft, rollicking mood. But it can also draw blood. That's what the people behind "Ruthless People" (citywide) are after. It's pitched in the half-cynical vein of the comic muckraker. It tries to make sport of human vice, greed and corruption, some of the best comic subjects. The characters here aren't just bad; most of them are truly vile--human slime.

All 11 current and former co-hosts will be reunited on "The View" on May 15, the day before Barbara Walters retires after more than five decades in broadcast journalism, ABC announced Wednesday. Stopping by to bid farewell will be former co-hosts Rosie O'Donnell, Elisabeth Hasselbeck, Joy Behar, Star Jones, Debbie Matenopoulos, Meredith Vieira and Lisa Ling. Also present will be the current lineup of Jenny McCarthy, Whoopi Goldberg and Sherri Shepherd. " Barbara Walters' status as a trailblazer, a legend and an icon are undeniable,” said Paul Lee, ABC Entertainment president, in a statement.

Finally, someone has designed a luxury hotel suite with wheels. Long-stay AKA Beverly Hills hotel has created a suite inside an Airstream trailer with leather interiors, full kitchen and bathroom, a bed with comfy linens, and even its trademark Bulgari bath amenities. Price-tag for a five-day trip to Santa Barbara: $6,000. Starting May 1, AKA guests can reserve the modified Airstream 2 Go and drive up the coast to spend two nights at Sunstone Vineyards in the wine-growing Santa Ynez Valley and two nights at Ocean Mesa Campground north of Santa Barbara.

Backstreet Boys heartthrob Nick Carter is a married man: He said "I do" over the weekend. The former boy bander, 34, who launched countless teen-girl crushes circa 2000, wed girlfriend Lauren Kitt on Saturday, he confirmed on Twitter late Sunday. "Happiest day of my life 4-12-2014 I married my best friend and woman of my dreams. Lauren Kitt Carter honeymoon time!" he wrote . PHOTOS: Celebrity weddings & engagements of 2014 If Kitt doesn't have a colorfully scrawled "Mrs.

For nearly two decades, Barbara Garnaus maintained a modest, delicate life balance: keeping her part-time Orange County school district job and juggling her bills and credit card debt. Now 63, living alone, she counts every dollar, has no cellphone and commutes an hour in traffic so she can keep an affordable apartment in Laguna Woods. Having good health helped. Garnaus got by without medical insurance, relying on yearly exams at a free clinic. But that changed last year: Garnaus now needs treatment for cancer, and she bought insurance under Obamacare.

Santa Barbara County prosecutors have charged a Los Angeles teen with assaulting a sheriff's deputy during a spring break party over the weekend in Isla Vista, an incident authorities say helped spark a violent melee that led to more than 100 people getting arrested. Desmond Louis Edwards, 17, was charged Tuesday with mayhem, resisting an officer, assault on an officer, causing great bodily injuring and committing a violent offense. Prosecutors are charging him as an adult. His arraignment was delayed until Thursday, television station KEYT reported.

Veteran TV journalist Barbara Walters will make her last scheduled appearance on "The View" on May 16, ABC announced Monday. The network will honor Walters' five decades in broadcasting with a week-long celebration. "The View," the daytime talk show she helped create back in 1997, will commemorate her departure beginning May 12. ABC also plans to air a two-hour prime-time special looking back at Walters' career on May 16, and will name ABC News Headquarters in New York City in her honor.

In an early homemade video made by the L.A. band the Belle Brigade for its song "Losers," from the sibling duo's self-titled debut, Barbara and Ethan Gruska, ages 28 and 21, respectively, sit holding acoustic guitars in an empty bathtub. They're wearing white robes and Barbara has a towel wrapped around her head, as though she's just gotten out of the shower. Ethan strums a few foundational chords, they start singing in harmony, and echoes of genetically intertwined voices throughout the ages come pouring out: the Everly Brothers, the Davies brothers of the Kinks, the Carter Family.

There could be more arrests in the wake of a riot that broke out over the weekend in a party town next to UC Santa Barbara thanks to newly installed surveillance cameras, officials said. In an interview with NewsChannel 3 , Santa Barbara County Sheriff Bill Brown said his department plans to prosecute those involved in the Saturday night riot that injured several officers and dozens of others and hopes the cameras can turn up more evidence against those involved. The cameras have been a point of tension with Isla Vista residents, reported the Daily Nexus, UC Santa Barbara's student paper.

Santa Barbara County officials said the melee that broke out during a spring break party near UC Santa Barbara is unacceptable and the culture of partying in the Isla Vista area must change. Santa Barbara County Supervisor Doreen Farr said that officials have already toughened laws after other parties that got out of control but that the university community also needs to do more. “It's clear that unsponsored events just have to end,” she said. "When you have thousands of people congregate, up to 15,000, it's just inviting chaos.” More than 100 people were arrested Saturday night and dozens were hurt when police and party participants clashed.